LN: One-third of Czechs know UN sustainable development goal.
Prague, July 18 (CTK) – One-third of Czechs know the U.N. goals in sustainable development, such as access to drinking water, according to a poll conducted by the Ipsos agency along with the Association of Social Responsibility and released in Lidove noviny (LN) today.
They include fighting extreme poverty, securing access to education, health care and drinking water for all and restricting corruption.
The poll conducted on 1000 respondents shows that 35 percent of Czechs know the sustainable development goals and they have noticed that their government adopted this commitment of a fair approach to the planet.
In the group of young people aged 18-24 years, even 50 percent are aware of the goals.
Sixty-six percent of respondents say it is primarily up to the government to see to sustainable development, while 49 percent would mainly leave this effort to international organisations.
On the contrary, young people under 24 stress that individuals must be involved in sustainable development, LN writes.
It also says that more and more Czechs realise that drinking wanter cannot be taken for granted, which was influenced by frequent dry seasons.
The Czech Republic was particularly praised for its access to drinking water, LN writes.
They plan to present its annual report in New York today to accompany an official assessment of the sustainable development goals fulfilment in the Czech Republic, prepared by the government, LN writes.

HAMDA ABDILAHI DHAMAC, Displaced Livestock Farmer (through interpreter): I used to be part of a family of livestock herders.
FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Humanitarian organizations are distributing emergency food to ease the crisis in the short-term.
FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Most of that money, $10 million, has come from the U.S. government.
ASHA ABDI ALI: It’s still difficult.
We’re afraid the community will get waterborne diseases from the animals.
FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Water which has collected at a nearby earthen dam, has been completely contaminated by both dead and diseased animals.
JEREMIAH KIBANYA: And if people use that water because of desperation, and they don’t have any other water to drink, that poses another threat again to outbreak of waterborne diseases to the communities.
FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Six years ago, Dilla was in a similar position of hosting displaced persons from a severe famine which ended up killing 260,000 people in Somalia.
The last time we supported displaced people who had come here, everybody ended up suffering.
For the PBS NewsHour, I’m Fred de Sam Lazaro reporting from Dilla, Somaliland.

United Nations — More than two billion people lack access to clean and safe drinking water, according to a new report released by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Although significant progress to ensure access to drinking water has been achieved, there is still a long way to go to ensure the quality of water–deemed free from pollutants and safe for drinking.
While many countries like India have made it a top priority, many others haven’t been able to emphasise the issue yet," Sanjay Wijesekera, Chief of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene at UNICEF, told IPS.
This puts lives, especially of young children, at great risk.
"Every day, 800 children under the age of five die from waterborne diseases like diarrhoea.
Wijesekera added.
A lack of access to clean drinking water is also bad news for hygiene and sanitary levels.
While the global drop in open defecation from 20 to 12 percent between 2000 and 2015 is a welcome fact, the rate of decline, at just .7 percent every year, puts pressure on governments to do more.
Still, some countries like Ethiopia have combatted the issue of open defecation successfully.
Critical building blocks like stronger policies at the government levels and dutiful allocation of funds can go a long way," Wijesekera said.

UN report says Gaza Strip is “unlivable” and warns of irreversible damage.
Piper says that not only are these projections on track but are in fact worse than previously forecast.
Tensions between Fatah and Hamas increased.
It is projected to be 2.2 million by 2020 and 3.1 million by 2030.
The combination of high unemployment levels and an increasing population could have damaging results.
The agricultural annual average between 2000 and 2006 reached $18 million but in 2014 it fell as low as $2.2 million.
Despite food assistance and other forms of social transfers, one million Palestinians in Gaza are “moderately-to-severely food insecure”.
Demand increase is projected anywhere between 550 MW and 850 MW.
Water that is imported in can be 15-20 times more expensive and as result the poor are most affected.
This is forecast to increase by 20% by 2020.

13 July 2017: The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) launched a publication that shares perspectives from 20 UN heads on how and why information and communication technologies (ICT) for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is critical.
ITU launched the publication at an event on the sidelines of the 2017 session of the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF).
First, it calls for leaving no one offline.
Second, the report showcases ways in which ICTs are an accelerator for innovation and change, sharing examples of farmers that use satellite imagery to monitor shifting climate patterns, land use and water scarcity and opportunities for ICTs to improve capabilities to gather, analyze, manage and exchange information on health and humanitarian interventions.
Finally, the report calls for creating new, innovative and multi-stakeholder partnerships to realize the SDGs and ensure a coordinated approach to leveraging ICTs to achieve the SDGs.
ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao recognized the particular role of ICTs in achieving SDG 9 (infrastructure, industrialization and innovation) and urged leveraging ICTs to advance achievement of all 17 of the SDGs.
Efforts to implement e-agriculture contribute to progress on SDG 2 (zero hunger).
On SDG 3 (good health and well-being), better connectivity and e-health initiatives support access to health care and services as well as exchange of critical health-related information.
ITU launched the report at an event, titled ‘ICT for sustainable development: How digital solutions can drive progress towards the SDGs,’ co-organized with the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), World Health Organization (WHO) and the SDG Lab.
[ITU Press Release] [Publication: Fast-forward progress] [ITU Secretary-General Blog Post on ICT for SDGs] [ITU ICT and SDG Platform]

2 Billion People Don’t Have Access To Clean Water, Opens up Fissures of Inequality.
Africa, Development & Aid, Economy & Trade, Environment, Featured, Food & Agriculture, Global, Headlines, Health, IPS UN: Inside the Glasshouse, Natural Resources, Water & Sanitation, Women’s Health UNITED NATIONS, Jul 13 2017 (IPS) – More than two billion people lack access to clean and safe drinking water, according to a new report released by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Although significant progress to ensure access to drinking water has been achieved, there is still a long way to go to ensure its quality—deemed free from pollutants and safe for drinking.
As many as 400 million people still rely on distant water sources—travelling to and fro from their homes to pick it up.
Some 159 million people, according to the report, rely on untreated water from lakes and streams.
“Every day, 800 children under the age of five die from waterborne diseases like diarrhoea.
A lack of access to clean drinking water is also bad news for hygiene and sanitary levels.
In many countries, open defecation due to the lack of in-house toilets poses a significant challenge.
While the global drop in open defecation from 20 to 12 percent between 2000 and 2015 is a welcome fact, the rate of decline, at just .7 percent every year, puts pressure on governments to do more.
Still, some countries like Ethiopia have combatted the issue of open defecation successfully.

A decade after Hamas seized the Gaza Strip, the living conditions for two million people in the Palestinian enclave are deteriorating “further and faster” than the prediction made in 2012 that the enclave would become “unlivable” by 2020, a new United Nations report has found.
“Gaza has continued on its trajectory of ‘de-development’, in many cases even faster than we had originally projected,” said Robert Piper, the UN Coordinator for Humanitarian Aid and Development Activities, in a press release on the new report, “Gaza – 10 years later.” In an intra-Palestinian conflict, Hamas took over Gaza in 2007.
Israel has sought to isolate the group by restricting the movements of goods and people in and out of the strip.
It was also administratively separated from the West Bank.
The report, compiled by the UN country team in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, took stock of some key indicators identified in an earlier 2012 UN report that predicted Gaza would become “unlivable” by 2020 unless underlying trends were reversed.
“The alternative will be a Gaza that is more isolated and more desperate,” warned the UN Coordinator for Humanitarian Aid and Development Activities.
It focused on water scarcity, unavailability of materials to allow the Gazan economy, infrastructure and basic services to recover from the 2014 conflict, and electricity supply, which is as low as at 90 megawatts in recent days against the 450 megawatts needed.
Average Palestinians are trapped in a “sad reality” and their daily lives are “getting more and more wretched,” the report notes.
On the eve of the release of the report Tuesday, the UN and non-governmental organizations conducted a field visit to Gaza with nine members of the diplomatic community from Australia, Canada, the European Union, Germany, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, to witness first-hand the cumulative impact of 10 years of closures and internal divide.
Short URL: http://me-confidential.com/?p=16481

The UN says plans to ship as many as one million doses of cholera vaccine to Yemen are likely to be shelved over security and logistical challenges.
Top United Nations officials on Wednesday slammed the warring parties in Yemen and their international allies for fuelling an unprecedented deadly cholera outbreak, driving millions closer to famine and hindering humanitarian aid access.
Since the end of April, the World Health Organisation said there have been more than 320,000 suspected cases of cholera – a disease that causes uncontrollable diarrhea – and 1,742 deaths across more than 90 percent of the Arabian Peninsula country.
"This cholera scandal is entirely man-made by the conflicting parties and those beyond Yemen’s borders who are leading, supplying, fighting and perpetuating the fear and the fighting," O’Brien said.
He called on the 15-member Council to "lean much more heavily and effectively on the parties and those outside Yemen" to end the conflict and humanitarian crisis.
Access barred UN officials on Tuesday said that plans to ship as many as 1 million doses of cholera vaccine to Yemen are likely to be shelved over security, access and logistical challenges, even as the deadly caseload continues to balloon in parts of the country.
A Saudi Arabia-led coalition intervened in Yemen’s civil war in 2015, backing government forces fighting Iran-allied Houthi rebels.
The country, which relies heavily on imports for food, has become one of the UN’s top humanitarian crises.
Yemen’s economy has collapsed and 30,000 health workers have not been paid for more than 10 months, so the UN has stepped in with "incentive" payments to get them to help with the fight against cholera.
UN Yemen mediator Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed told the Security Council a Saudi donation of $67 million had helped slow the cholera spread and called on other donors to step up.

Billions of People Lack Safe Water, Sanitation.
A new report finds more than two billion people lack access to safe drinking water and more than twice that number or 4.5 billion people lack safe sanitation.
The report by the World Health Organization and U.N. Children’s Fund is the first global assessment of water, sanitation and hygiene for the Sustainable Development Goals.
The United Nations reports nearly 850,000 people die every year from lack of access to good water, sanitation and hygiene.
This includes more than 360,000 children under age five who die from diarrhea and many others from diseases such as cholera, dysentery, hepatitis A and typhoid.
The joint report by the World Health Organization and U.N. Children’s Fund finds people living in rural areas in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia are most at risk of disease and death from poor water and sanitation-related sources.
He says many homes, healthcare facilities and schools have no soap and water for handwashing.
UNICEF Chief of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene, Sanjay Wijesekera says such progress would have a knock-on effect on other development areas.
“For children, access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene not only keeps them alive and healthy, but it gives them a chance to go to school and gain an education.
Open defecation is practiced by more than 890 million people, mainly in rural areas, who have no toilet or latrine.

Billions of People Lack Safe Water, Sanitation.
A new report finds more than two billion people lack access to safe drinking water and more than twice that number or 4.5 billion people lack safe sanitation.
The report by the World Health Organization and U.N. Children’s Fund is the first global assessment of water, sanitation and hygiene for the Sustainable Development Goals.
The United Nations reports nearly 850,000 people die every year from lack of access to good water, sanitation and hygiene.
This includes more than 360,000 children under age five who die from diarrhea and many others from diseases such as cholera, dysentery, hepatitis A and typhoid.
The joint report by the World Health Organization and U.N. Children’s Fund finds people living in rural areas in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia are most at risk of disease and death from poor water and sanitation-related sources.
He says many homes, healthcare facilities and schools have no soap and water for handwashing.
UNICEF Chief of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene, Sanjay Wijesekera says such progress would have a knock-on effect on other development areas.
“For children, access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene not only keeps them alive and healthy, but it gives them a chance to go to school and gain an education.
Open defecation is practiced by more than 890 million people, mainly in rural areas, who have no toilet or latrine.